Advancing sanding technology for wood and wood-based materials I. Experimental development of a flexible sanding device

A flexible sanding device (FSD) was developed experimentally with the objective of using it for automatic sanding of furniture parts with a curved surface. The FSD was produced from the concept of production development by trial experiments. The sanding performance of this device was then evaluated. A board of Sugi (Cryptomeria japonica D. Don) with a curved surface (length: 800 mm, width: 180 mm, thickness: 30 mm, radius of curvature: 4010 mm) representing a drawer front of a chest of drawers. Sanding performance with respect to dimensional accuracy and surface roughness of the automatically sanded material were examined. The following results were obtained: 1) The flexible sanding device produced by trial experiments could be used for automatic sanding of sugi boards with a curved surface. 2) In the length direction of the material sanded, dimensional errors before and after sanding were within +/-0.06 mm. 3) Dimensional errors of sanding in the width direction ranged from +0.042 min to -0.037 mm. 4) In the length or width directions of sanding almost no difference in surface roughness by measuring position was observed. 5) Unevenness between earlywood and latewood on the sanded surface of the sugi board was almost unnoticeable. 6) From the above results, it was concluded that the flexible sanding device could be used for automatic sanding of furniture parts with a curved surface.